Whatever the nature and influence of the family bringing-up may have
been, in any particular case, the general tendency toward lack of
discipline and disregard for authority can hardly fail to be reflected
in the prevailing standards of the boys and girls to be found at any
school. They have no connection with school regulations or school
penalties. It is the fundamental question of instincts, desires, and
notions--the attitude toward themselves and toward life outside the
school-room which they are going to take with them where-ever they go.
The tendency begun at home finds reinforcement and further development
in the boy or girl by example and contact with others, who are headed
the same way.
Next comes the third group: The influence of public opinion--of
tradition and customs.
There is no mistaking the fact that in the present generation there have
been many striking changes in the prevailing customs, as they apply to
the behavior and conduct of individuals. The growing boys and girls see
these changes taking place on every hand.
When mother and father were young, Sunday was a day set aside for
church-going and dull and decorous behavior. Games and fun of all kinds
were laid away, everybody put on their best clothes and sat around and
talked, or took quiet walks with an overhanging air of seemly propriety.
To-day there are tennis and golf and baseball games and dinner-parties
and gambling at the bridge-table, in which mother and father
participate along with the rest.
It used to be considered improper for a girl of good family to go out at
night to any kind of party without being accompanied by a chaperon.
Nowadays, the girl who is obliged to take a chaperon with her wherever
she goes, is liable to be laughed at by her up-to-date friends.
It was not so long ago that in any respectable community, a woman who
painted her face, smoked cigarettes, drank cocktails and gambled with
the men, would have been considered a shocking spectacle of depravity
that no self-respecting wife, or mother, could accept or tolerate.
Nowadays, the growing boy and girl have only to open their eyes to see
women doing such things everywhere--as likely as not their aunts and
cousins, or their own mothers.
Examples of this nature could be given in great variety, but enough has
been suggested to show the trend. In another connection it will be
interesting to discuss these manifestations in greater detail and
reflect on their cause and meaning.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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